1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a gateway for dynamically providing Web Site status information and, more specifically, to a gateway which allows a user to dynamically gather information on which pages within a Web Site have been updated.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The methods by which companies conduct business with their customers are undergoing fundamental changes, due in large part to World Wide Web technology. In addition, the same technology that makes a company accessible to the world, may be used on internal company networks for conducting operational and administrative tasks.
One of the technologies underlying the World Wide Web is the Web Browser. Web Browsers have become a de facto user interface standard because of their ability to interpret and display information having standard formats (e.g., HyperText Markup Language (HTML), standard text, GIF, etc.). Client software programs, popularly referred to as Web Browsers (e.g., Mosaic, Netscape Navigator, Microsoft Internet Explorer, etc.), execute on client systems and issue requests to server systems. The server systems typically execute HyperText Transport Protocol (HTTP) server programs which process requests from the Web Browsers and deliver data to them. The system that executes an HTTP server program and returns data to the Web Browser will hereinafter be referred to as a Web Server System. An HTTP server program itself will be referred to as a Web Server.
A Web Server System has access to on-line documents that contain data written in HyperText Markup Language (HTML). The HTML documents contain display parameters, capable of interpretation by a Web Browser, and references to other HTML documents and Web Servers (source: World Wide Web: Beneath the Surf, from UCL Press, by Mark Handley and Jon Crowcroft, on-line at http://www.cs.ucl.ac.uk/staff/jon/book/book.html).
Typically, information regarding a given Web Site is "hard coded" into an associated Web Page written in HyperText Markup Language (HTML). For example, most Web Sites will have links to other Web Sites. If additional links are to be added, as will occur when new information is added to a Web Site, the HTML code for the Web Site must be modified to provide access to these links. Thus, it is a formidable and time consuming task to keep these HTML links both functional and current.
Furthermore, a list of "recent updates to this Web Site" is typically included as part of the Web Site, and is usually maintained by a Web Site administrator. If a Web Site has frequent changes (e.g., when information is added to a Web Site), this updating process can be a burden, and users may not always have information regarding the latest state of the Web Site.